


It's all Fun and Games (until somebody has to call the dads)

by Rei



Category: Avengers (Comic), Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Superfamily
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-06-02
Updated: 2012-07-22
Packaged: 2017-11-06 15:26:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/420379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rei/pseuds/Rei
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was dark and cold and in the blue-ish light of his Stark phone the blood on his fingertips looked almost black. It was his own, which made everything so much worse.<br/>Or the story where Peter really doesn't want to call his dads, even though he probably should.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. We all fall down

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AU where Steve and Tony are Peter's dads. Yep, it's a superfamily-one. I blame tumblr. Probably a mix between comic- and movie-verse. (Timeline, what timeline?)  
> Beta-read by the lovely Ishilde - everything that's good about this fic is due to her, the remaining mistakes are all mine.

"Uncle Bruce…?" 

"Peter?" Bruce's voice sounded thin and fuzzy through the Stark phone; the reception was kind of shaky down here. "Hi. I'm kind of busy right now… Oh, wait a minute. Where are you? Your dads were searching for you earlier, I think…"

"Yeah, I imagine. I…uhm…" Peter swallowed hard and tried again. "Actually this is really embarrassing." He tried to laugh, but it turned into a cough. 

"Are you okay?" 

"Yes. No? Maybe. I guess? I mean…mostly. Yeah. I'm practically…almost…really…okay."

"Peter."  
Peter flinched. Bruce's voice was eerily calm now. He sounded as if he was doing yoga in his mind to keep calm. At least that's what his dad always said when Bruce started to sound like this.

"It's actually kind of funny," Peter hurried to add. "It's a fun story. A…a child-friendly story about your friendly neighborhood Spiderman. Really…it's funny and…"

"Where are you?"

"Don't tell my dads, okay?" he blurted out. "Oh God, please don't tell my dads, they're going to kill me or worse they're going to ground me until I'm old enough for retirement and I'm not even joking. They keep talking about grounding me until I'm thirty, which is seriously unfair because how am I supposed to survive fifteen years of imprisonment and…"

"Peter, _where are you?_ " Now Bruce was definitely doing yoga. There was rustling at the other end of the line as if he had stood up and was walking somewhere. 

Peter took a deep breath. And another. His hands were shaking. That wasn't good. Why were his hands shaking? "I…I'm not sure."

" _What?_ "

"That's…it's just… I told you it was a funny story!"

Except it wasn't funny. It really, really wasn't.  
It was dark and cold and in the blue-ish light of his Stark phone the blood on his fingertips looked almost black. It was his own, which made everything so much worse. 

"Please…" He said, his voice sounding small and alien even to his own ears. He blinked to clear his blurring vision. "Don't tell them. I'll be fine. I could be home by dinner and they would never have to know! You know how dad is - he's just going to beat himself up over it. And they're going to fight again. And it would all be for nothing, right? Because you could just come and get me…please?"  
He was pretty sure he sounded as small and childish as he felt right now, stuck in the pitch blackness. 

"Listen Peter…everything's going to be okay," Bruce said calmly. "But you have to tell me where you are. What do you remember? What happened?" 

"It's really dark," Peter said and frowned at himself. That wasn't really helpful, was it? His brain felt muddled, like scrambled eggs.  
Steve had made scrambled eggs for him this morning, he remembered distantly. A little bit on the salty side and way too overcooked but he had looked at him so expectantly that Peter hadn't had the heart to tell him that. Was it okay that he just wanted to be home now? 

"-ter? _Peter!_ " Bruce wasn't sounding so yoga anymore. He actually sounded a little bit breathless, as if he was walking really fast. 

"I'm still here. I'm not going anywhere. Not that I could, you know? That's why I was calling… I'm a little bit stuck here." 

"Listen, stay where you are. We'll get you, okay? We'll get you." 

"Okay. Sure. I'll just stay here. And wait." It took almost a minute until Peter realized he had said _'we'_. WE. Not I.  
Which could only mean one thing. Oh shit…oh shit… no, no, no…!

"Uncle Bruce?" he asked, slightly panicked. "Please don't tell…"

"Peter!"  
Peter flinched. Even through the wobbly connection Tony managed to sound furious. "Where the hell are you? You should've been home _hours_ ago!" 

"I know…Dad, I'm sorry. I can explain… I guess…?" Peter realized he was babbling. It was an effect his father's disapproval always had on him. That and head traumas. "There was a situation…and I really wanted to call for help, but there was no time and I really had to…"

"I can't believe you!" Added another voice. It was Steve. Steve who sounded really angry and really disappointed. Peter groaned. Oh, that wasn't good. With Tony it was all bark and no bite, but when Steve got really angry, he was all cold rage and disappointed glares and if Peter could bear anything less than Tony's guilt trips than it was Steve's silent disappointment. "We talked about that! No Spiderman-business without informing us first!" 

Somewhere in the background Bruce was obviously trying to say something, but nobody was listening to him anymore. Well Peter could have told him his attempts would be fruitless, because nobody ever listened to him either. Certainly not his dads, who sounded as though they were going at each other's throat again. 

"I told you right from the start, we should've locked him in his room as soon as the whole Spiderman-business started." Tony said. 

"Oh, because that's your resolution to everything, isn't it?" Steve hissed. "Lock something away until you don't have to remember it anymore and throw away the key?"

"Could you stop with the whole "holier-than-you"-attitude? Your son just…" 

"Why is he always _MY_ son when he misses curfew and _YOUR_ son when aces his math test?" 

"Look, I'm really…" Peter tried. 

"You tell us where you are, right now!“ Steve demanded. 

"And you’re grounded.“ Tony added. Peter flinched at the angry undertone in his voice. "You’re grounded for the rest of your life and possibly afterwards, too! Believe me, I'll make it possible!“

"But that’s not fair," Peter whined. "I just wanted to…“ He inhaled some more dust and coughed again. It was a lot more painful this time and he was pretty sure it did something not cool to his ribs. It left him spent and breathless and for a second he saw stars. 

For a second the other end of the line was quiet, which was all the more disturbing. Peter was about to say something to lighten the mood (or possibly to ask for a lawyer) when Steve spoke again.  
"Peter, are you hurt?“ He sounded different now, less Captain America and more 'dad' which was unusual, because usually _captaining_ was Steve’s preferred way of dealing with any kind of 'situation'. 

Peter swallowed hard and thought of an answer that wouldn’t get him into even more trouble. Outright lying to Steve was out of the question, but so was telling the truth. "Not…a lot?“ he tried. 

"Peter." Tony‘s voice sounded strained now. „ Where are you?“

"Have you hurt your head? Are you bleeding?" Steve added worriedly. 

"Uhm…can I plead the fifth on that one?" 

"No, you can't! Peter, tell me right now…"

"…I think a house a collapsed on me.“

" _…What?!_ "

Peter blinked and frowned, trying to grasp the memory. "Aww, shit", he said slowly, almost face-palming himself with his Stark phone. " I-I think I'm stuck under a building. That's why it's so dark…and why I can't move. Shit. Not cool. Not. Cool. Damn." 

"How did that happen?!" "What did you do?" "Where are you?" "Peter!" Okay, nobody was yoga anymore. So not yoga anymore. Jesus. What was it with the yelling today?

"There was an explosion," Peter said. "I think, I remember…gas? You must have heard it on the news?"

There was more silence. 

"There was a gas explosion in the 3rd avenue," Bruce said slowly. Obviously his dads were rendered speechless. "It was two hours ago! Peter, don't tell me you've been there! On the news they said nobody was inside!" 

"Yes! Because **I** got them all out!" Peter protested. "And I wasn't on the inside…I was stuck outside at the wall. I think… I don't really remember what…"  
More dust hit his lungs and he started coughing again. This time he blacked out for a few moments, and when he came to he wasn't really sure how much time had passed; it could have been seconds or minutes. 

"Peter!" Somebody was yelling at him. It sounded like Tony, except Peter had never before heard his dad sound so worried. 

"Still there…" he managed to croak. 

After that everything became slightly blurry and out of focus. At one point he was pretty sure he heard voices and yelling. It sounded suspiciously like his dads. Yelling at each other. Or at him. He wasn’t sure, but at any rate, this couldn’t be good. 

His dads had been yelling at each other a lot during the last few weeks. 

Admittedly, they _always_ yelled at each other and usually it wasn’t such a big deal (sometimes Peter got the feeling they got some perverse kind of thrill out of arguing with each other about everything), but this time things had been…different.  
After all there was yelling and…yelling. Yelling in a ' _you’re so stubborn and I really don’t know why I love you so much, but I do_ '-way (which was disturbing enough when it’s your parents you‘re talking about) was fine, but there was also yelling in a way that made Peter’s stomach hurt, because it sounded way too much like a ' _I want a divorce_ ' or ' _I never ever want to see you again_ '. 

Peter had tried to think about it logically, but the truth was he wasn’t sure if there was any possible outcome that wouldn’t result in a complete disaster should Tony split ever up with Steve. Statistics said no. Peter honestly didn’t even want to imagine.  
He was pretty sure that Tony had decided to even try and raise his teenage son was due to Steve and his ability at making everything seem manageable and easy and…right. So Peter wasn’t sure how Tony would do on the father-front without Steve to talk him through. Probably not great. And Steve…Steve wasn’t his real dad – not by blood anyway. So why would he even bother taking care of a misbehaving teenager if it wasn’t for Tony’s sake? 

So every scenario Peter could come up with ended with him put in foster care and the world in grave danger, because Iron Man had drunk himself into a coma and Captain America had decided the world didn’t deserve to be saved any longer.  
Which…was so not good. None of that. 

The worst thing about the whole clusterfuck though, was that he had the nagging feeling that at least part of the whole fighting was his fault.  
His fault and Spiderman’s fault, because obviously his dads weren’t really happy with him trying to be a crime-fighting super hero - which was so hypocritical and all kinds of unfair, unfair and unfair with a side dish of unfair.  
Steve had been talking about raising the appropriate age for SHIELD agents to thirty ("What? That’s ridiculous! You’re barely thirty yourself!“ "I’m old enough to know better and we don’t back-talk to America in this house, young man!“ - well, that was what Peter remembered from this particular talk) and Tony had talked about grounding him for the next ten years and somehow both had found reasons why the other was at fault for Peter ' _misbehaving like that_ '.  
Peter wasn't misbehaving, okay?  
Other teenagers his age were doing drugs or reading twilight and _he was saving people!_ Jesus Christ. How was that misbehaving? 

But of course you couldn't talk rationally about that with his dads, because Steve was all ' _it's too dangerous, Peter!_ " and Tony was all ' _can't you have a normal hobby? Like watching porn?_ '. 

Which was exactly why he had called Bruce, instead of them in the first place.  
Nobody ever got angry at Uncle Bruce and he almost never got angry at anybody else and he was always really nice and laid-back about everything. Admittedly 'the other guy' wasn’t always so nice, but Peter had privately thought of him as a kind of somewhat wild roommate, that cohabited Bruce‘s…hemisphere. Or something like that. 

"…Peter?" A tiny distorted voice said. It was Steve. Somehow Peter had forgotten that he was still on the phone. It might have been the heaps of angst he had been wallowing in. Or it might have been a possible head injury that had him spacing out like that. Whatever it was it started to get really disturbing really fast. 

"Hn?" 

"You still with me? Pete?" 

"I'm…yes. Why? Wasn't I?" 

"You stopped talking just now. Don't do that, okay?" 

"I was talking?" He blinked, feeling sleepy and not really there at all.  
Somehow it reminded him of all the early Sunday mornings when Steve had tried to persuade him to go running with him, when clearly Peter had been barely awake enough to coordinate his limbs enough to walk down the stairs without bumping into walls and doorframes. Like Tony, Peter was _not_ a morning person.  
Except…oh yes. It wasn't early Sunday morning and nobody wanted to go jogging with him. He was still stuck under a building (most embarrassing fate of a superhero _ever!_ God, they would never let him live it down) and it was probably evening already, he wasn't sure, having lost all sense of time, being stuck here in the darkness. 

"Yes, you were." Steve's voice was soft. "You were saying some stuff… we really need to talk about that, Pete. But not right now." 

He…wait. What. _What?_  
Oh…crap. Somehow that roused him a lot more quickly than any alarm clock ever did.  
Jesus Christ on a stick. Had he actually said any of his crazy, stupidly angst-filled musings out loud? He groaned involuntary. 

"What's wrong?" Steve asked immediately. 

"Nothing. Pops, listen…it…I just…" he stopped, unsure what he was about to explain, since he didn't _even know_ which parts he might have spilled accidentally. Crap! 

"Don't stop. Keep talking to me", Steve ordered. "We're almost there." Voices were shouting in the background and there was some noise that sounded a lot like a huge power shovel, but was probably some of Tony's more elaborated tech. 

Peter nodded absently, still beating himself up inwardly. Ugh. Steve wasn't meant to hear all this. 

"Pete." Steve sounded almost fond. "Don't just nod at me. You need to actually _say_ something here."

"…sorry."

"And keep your head covered. Tony thinks he has detected you - did you know he's tracking the GPS in your stark phone?"

"He does what?! DAD!" 

Steve snorted. "Yeah, me neither." 

"I told you, it's _not_ paranoia when it's your son!" Tony's voice snapped from somewhere in the background. "You would do the same thing! How are you doing down there, Bambi? You good?" 

" _Dad!_ " Peter groaned again, embarrassed. Somebody, _who sounded a lot like Clint_ , snickered in the background. Somebody who would find a lot of spiders in his bed during the next few weeks, Peter would make sure of that. "Don't call me that!" 

"After that stunt you pulled, we get to call you anything we want", Steve said firmly. "On the good news - I think Natasha has just scared the entire fire department and the whole police too death, because they didn't even notice someone got buried when the building collapsed." 

"She's here?" Peter asked, somewhat confused. 

"Pete…they're all here", Steve said gently. 

"Oh…but I…it's just…" Suddenly there was a dull roar that seemed to be closer than Peter would've expected. "Is that uncle Bruce?" 

"Careful, big guy", Steve said on the other end of the line, obviously talking to the Hulk. "We're pretty close. We don't want to accidentally smash him."

The Hulk roared again.  
The ground seemed to shake beneath him and Peter flinched as it reminded him instantly of his definitely bruised and possibly broken ribs. Dust and debris started to rain down on him in heaps and had him coughing again. Hastily he squeezed his eyes shut.  
Obviously there were _really_ close. 

He started to blink when frantic hands started to touch him and tried to turn him around.  
"Careful, don't hurt him!"  
"Pete!"

Bright light hit his eyes and he flinched. When he opened them again, half of the Avengers were gathered around him - Hawkeye was waving at him, Black Widow looked disheveled and annoyed (but that was Natasha's default expression when she was worried) - but all he could see were Iron Man and Captain America who peered down at him.  
Steve wasn't wearing his cowl and Tony's faceplate was wide open. Both shared the same scared, almost frantic expression, Steve lips were tightly pressed together and Tony's eyes were dark. 

"Hey…", Peter smiled weakly up at them. "You guys took your time." 

"You're so grounded", Tony said, but it sounded choked somehow. Distantly Peter realized Steve had put his hand on Tony's shoulder supportively.  
Somehow that, more than anything else, made him feel safe and relaxed, and obviously this was the moment when his body decided he really didn't want to stay awake any longer. He almost didn't realize how his eyes slid close again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's possibly going to be more - but it would be incredibly schmoopy and comfort-y and I'm not sure anybody would want to read that. ^^*


	2. Aftershock

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I lied. It's still not the schmoopy comfort-part. Instead this chapter focuses on Steve and Tony and it's mostly told from Steve's point of view (except one scene in the beginning). It's mostly introspective, but I hope it's not too boring.

_The ground shook._  
His spider sense warned him before he even heard the sound of the explosion. Heat, dust and debris engulfed him and he pressed his eyes shut quickly. The wall he stuck to seemed to crumble right beneath his fingertips.  
In the last minute he tried to jump off of it, but a chunk of something heavy smashed against his side and he was free falling and then …nothing. 

"Peter?" A calm voice said. "Are you awake?" 

A dream.  
He coughed.  
Just a dream. Was it a dream?  
No. Something had happened. 

"…hngh?" Everything was blurry and out of focus and his head ached something fierce. Peter blinked, but his vision refused to clear. "What…?"

"You're fine. I'm just checking on you." A small, cool hand touched his aching forehead and Peter caught a glimpse of red hair and a very serious face. 

"…-tasha?" 

She nodded. "You're in SHIELD's head quarter. Emergency room." 

SHIELD. Emergency room.  
Of course he was. The damn beeping of the monitors always gave it away. That and the smell of antiseptic and weird chemical concoctions.  
But SHIELD…wasn't good, right? He remembered the voice of his dad all too clearly. Can't trust SHIELD, can't ever trust SHIELD. 

"I…but…they can't…", he started anxiously. 

"You're _fine_. I promise." She sounded so sure, he almost believed her. 

Peter blinked harder and turned his head, questioningly. There was something…something he needed. "Where…?"

He wasn't even sure what he had tried to ask, but when she answered she told him the only thing that mattered. "You're dads are here. They're right outside the door. The doctor is on his way to talk to them and I'm sure they're going to insist to take you home now." 

Something akin to relief uncurled in his stomach, even though he would never admit it out loud. It was stupid, really, after all he was fifteen and not five anymore. But there were few things in the world that made him feel more safe than the presence of his dads, and not only because they were Captain America and Iron Man. 

"Are you okay? You were moaning in your sleep."

He tried to smile but it probably came out like a grimace. "Fine…pro'bly just…wet dream…"

She made a soft noise that was part fond and part exasperated. "Go back to sleep, Bambi."

"…don't call me …" He was out like a light again before he even had the chance to finish the sentence. 

*

Tony was pacing.  
Tony always did a lot of pacing, when he was worried. He also had the tendency to talk really fast and he did a lot of excessive gesturing. Even more than usual which was saying something.  
"I want them supervised," he was saying right now. It was the third time. 

"Tony, these people are medics and doctors and nurses. They're qualified to do this job." Steve replied, also for the third time.  
Watching Tony was calming and aggravating at the same time. But that wasn't new. Tony had always been an endless list of contradictions, the epitome of challenges and of oppositions and everything fast and… and sparkly and confusing.  
'Sparkly' was a word Steve hadn't even used before he had met Tony. 

"Yeah? Are they? Can you prove that? No, I don't think you can. I don't trust them. I want them supervised the whole time. Jarvis?"

"Sir?"

"Keep an eye on them. And with eye I mean camera. And tell me when anything seems fishy. And don't hesitate to use lasers to make a point!"

"Very well, sir."

"Tony…" Steve sighed and rubbed a hand across his face. "Tony, stop it. You can't let Jarvis hack into SHIELD's cameras again." He had done it before (at least twice) and it had never ended well. "Natasha said she was going to look out for him. I'm sure wherever she is, she…" 

"Oh yeah? See if I can. And if there's nothing fishy going on, why won't they let us in? We shouldn’t have let them bring him here. You know how eager SHIELD is to get their claws into Pete's DNA! Bruce? Bruce!"

Bruce raised an eyebrow. He leaned next to Tony and Steve at a wall and looked vaguely uncomfortable as if he were rather anywhere but here right now. "Yes?" Bruce asked carefully. He took his glasses off. 

"You're a doctor, right? "

"I'm not really a doctor," Bruce said patiently. 

"But you did treat patients and stuff! In Algiers."

"Kolkata." 

"But you _did_ treat patients!" 

"Tony." Steve put a hand on his shoulder. "Tony, calm down, okay?" 

"Calm down?! Calm down?! How can I…?!" 

Steve interrupted him mid-sentence with a somewhat mean and underhand tactic when he wrapped his arms around him and pulled him close to his chest.  
He hadn't done that for a while, he realized. Just…holding Tony. 

Sometimes it worked. He wasn't sure if it would this time.  
At first Tony resisted; his whole body was tense and skittish at the same time, back ramrod straight, and for a second Steve was worried it had been _too much, too soon, not enough, all wrong_ … but after what felt like minutes Tony eventually began to relax into the embrace. 

Simply holding Tony had always been a challenge, but sometimes touch worked when words didn't.  
Because Tony, despite how hard he tried to keep people at a distance, was deep down a very physical, a very touchy-feely person. He always needed to _touch_ things to see how they worked and maybe even to believe that they were real. It was a trait he had shared with Howard (or at least the Howard Steve had known) and one he also shared with Peter. They all had a very hands-on, ' _what's that? does it explode? can I touch that?_ '-approach to the world. 

Steve stroked his hand down Tony's neck. He could feel the jittery pulse fluttering beneath his fingertips; and the dark, little curls in Tony's neck were damp with sweat from agitation and probably from the frantic pacing. He could hear the rapid beat of Tony's heart against his rips and it made him want to hold Tony a little bit closer. 

"It's okay", Steve said softly. "Pete's going to be fine."

It wasn't easy to say, mostly because he wasn't sure he believed it himself.  
Usually SHIELD wouldn't have been their first choice, but as soon as Peter had lost consciousness Steve had started to panic and SHIELD…well, they had been there and they had offered to help. 

"I know." Tony's voice sounded muted because his face was still pressed against Steve's shoulder. "Of course. That's not what… that's not what I was talking about. I was just voicing my complete and utter distrust of _anything_ SHIELD does or says at any given time." 

"Right." Steve loosened his embrace a little and Tony stepped back, an awkward mix between embarrassment and reluctance on his face. His gaze flickered up to Steve's face and quickly back to the ground again. 

"It's just…I don't trust them. Not at all."

"I know."

"We should've brought him home."

"Yes. Maybe." 

"I'm not…I'm not worried, okay? There's no reason to worry." 

"No there isn't. He'll be fine." Steve threw Bruce a somewhat desperate look. 

"Uhm. He…yes. Probably. It looked like most of the injuries where superficial ones," Bruce said quickly. "Possibly a few broken bones, but with his accelerated healing, he should be fine in a few days. The disorientation and loss of consciousness, well that's not…great, to be honest, but it's not uncommon with head injuries. His skull seemed to be fine, no bone fractures as far as I could tell. It's probably just a concussion." 

His skull…  
Steve closed his eyes. It felt like a flashback, except it was too fresh, too bright and painful, like looking directly into the sun.  
He remembered the sharp taste of anxiety in the back of his throat as Peter's eyes had slid shut. He remembered picking Peter up from the ground, covered in dust and dirt, the costume bloody and torn. His head…it would've lolled back if Steve hadn't supported him with one hand, and the realization had hit him like a punch to the solar plexus, how the back of Peter's head still fitted perfectly in the palm of his hand, just the way it had when Peter had been a kid.  
The images blurred together in his head. Peter's tooth-gap grin as a kid and the slack, white face against the dark concrete.  
So small. So breakable. All skinny limbs and his skull still baby-soft and easily broken. 

And Blood… There had been blood on Peter's face. Maybe a head injury. It was always hard to tell with the red costumes, same with Tony. But there had been blood in his hair, parts of it already dried and sticky, but other parts still running lazily down his forehead and across his cheeks.  
Steve swallowed.  
He felt sick all of a sudden. 

He must have made a sound, or maybe he hadn’t, but all of a sudden Tony was right in his personal space and he looked at him with a funny expression, one Steve couldn't quite decipher. "Hey," he said, "hey, it's going to be okay. You said so yourself." 

"Yeah." Steve nodded. 

"And you're Captain fucking America. If you say something, it better be the truth. It's like the law, okay? It's like the word of God or something." 

"Don't blaspheme, Tony," Steve said softly.  
It was probably silly and old-fashioned, but it made him feel anxious and strangely vulnerable when people were being blasphemous in an hour of need. After all there might be a god or there might not, but if there was it might only be his goodwill on your side that could prevent things from becoming so much worse than they already were. 

Helplessly he watched as Tony started to pace again. Every part of him wanted to reach out again, but he didn't. 

Sometimes everything was so easy with Tony, easier than breathing, like falling backwards into a heap of pillows.  
But recently things hadn't been easy anymore, they had been anything but, to be honest. Until today he hadn't realized that Peter must have noticed it, too. He had never before said anything.

Steve closed his eyes and turned away. He lowered himself on one of the ugly grey plastic chairs that SHIELD had standing around. They had obviously put an effort to create the ugly and uncomforting atmosphere of a hospital waiting room (Steve wasn’t sure if he should appreciate that).  
Peter's voice was still echoing in the back of his mind.  
He had been barely conscious back then and Steve hadn't been able to make sense of everything he had been saying. But some things still stuck with him. 

' _…don't fight…please…'_

_'…ever split up… can't do this to me…_

_'…happen to me…? What would happen to the world?'_

_'… don't want… in foster care …_ '

He desperately needed to talk to Tony. Tony had a right to know these things.  
Especially Tony.  
After all…after all he was really Peter's dad. In every way that counted.  
Not like Steve.

_'…not my real dad… why would you bother…?'_

The quiet confession had taken him completely by surprise. For a second Steve had felt knocked out, blindsided and painfully breathless as if somebody was squeezing the air out of his lungs.  
Peter had been living with them for six years now and during all this time…Steve had felt…he had assumed…he had been sure…

But he couldn't think about that right now. Not before they knew for sure that Pete would be all right.  
Maybe not even then. 

"Mr. Stark, Mr. Rogers." 

Steve jerked up. Tony seemed to be frozen on the spot. 

"Please tell them he's going to be all right," Bruce stated calmly. He was playing with his glasses again. "Preferably right now and preferably in these exact words, and before you start with the usual medical babble. Thank you. They'll appreciate it. As would I."

The young doctor (it might have been a scientist, you could never tell when it came to SHIELD) looked kind of irritated and cleared his throat several times before he said: "Are you here on behalf of Peter Parker?"

"What does it look like?" Tony growled. "We're not here because the scenery is so nice. Where is he? _How_ is he? What have you _done_ to him?"

The doctor threw a nasty gaze towards Bruce (which was completely unjustified), as if he was personally responsible for Tony being more difficult than usual. "He suffered from some abrasions, cuts and bruises, a couple of broken ribs, a dislocated shoulder, a concussion and some minor dehydration. But we assume he's going to make a complete recovery. Due to his…uhm… _unusual_ metabolism there are already first signs of healing. It is truly fascinating. He spiked a low-grade fever, but that's probably just a side-effect of his…condition." 

"Probably?" Tony glared at him. " _Probably?_ Do you know _anything_? And what do you mean 'unusual condition?' Are you trying to insult my perfectly normal child? I really hope you’re not, because if you are…" 

"Tony", Steve said and stepped next to him. To the doctor he said: "We'd like to see him now, please." 

"We would like to run some more tests first to see how…"

Tony had already opened his mouth to reply, but Steve beat him to it.  
"No," he said, very, very calmly and used his considerable height to tower over the young man. "No, you won't. I understand that Peter is a very fascinating person, but you're not going to treat my injured son like a guinea pig. We're going to see him. Now. Is that clear?" 

The doctor swallowed audible. "Yes. Sir. Captain." 

"Can we take him home?" Tony asked. 

"Well, we would like to keep him here overnight for…"

"Let me rephrase Tony’s question", Steve said. "Is there any kind of _medical_ reason why he should stay here overnight? Is there anything that still needs to be done?" 

"N-no. Probably not. Just observation."

"We have Jarvis for that," Tony growled, just as Steve said: "Thank you."  
He had been going for 'polite', but it might have sounded intimidating instead. Right now Steve wasn't sure he cared. 

Behind him Bruce cleared his throat. "I hate to bring this up, guys…"

Steve and Tony turned to him at the same time. "What?" 

Bruce frowned a little. He was playing with his glasses, obviously indecisive if he should continue. Eventually he did. "I'm not trying to rain on anybody's parade here. But shouldn't you be worried about something else here, too?" 

"What else is there to…?"

"Your son was buried underneath a twenty-seven-story-building and he called _me_ instead of you, because he was so scared you two were going to fight again?" Bruce said softly. "I think that should worry you. It would worry me if he were my kid." 

"He was scared we would ground him," Tony corrected him, but he didn’t sound convinced. 

"He was scared you would fight again," Bruce insisted politely, but firmly. 

Tony opened and closed his mouth, before he laughed shortly. It wasn't a happy laugh. "We…we don't fight that much." 

Steve sighed and massaged his temples. "Tony…I think we should talk."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter should be from Peter's perspective again and then I finally should be able to write all the schmoopy comfort-stuff I had in mind when I started this fic. Honestly. XD


End file.
